Classical music

Classical music (also called Academic Music) is the musical current that is based mainly on music produced or derived from the traditions of liturgical and secular music of the West, mainly Western Europe, and that has a fundamentally written transmission reference. , which gives it a rigorous meaning and character for its reproduction or interpretation. Although in a broad way it covers a period of time that goes approximately from the  11th century. Currently, its use is often restricted to refer to Academic Music prior to the 20th century, although in essence and despite the fact that Classical Music of the 20th century has substantial stylistically different differences with that produced in previous centuries, it is considered the result of the same evolutionary process experienced before. Yes OK,The main characteristics of the genre were codified mainly between 1550 and 1900, which is usually considered as the characteristic period of production of classical music, its development extends throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. In a historiographical sense, early classical music is divided into several periods: early or medieval music, which covers the period comprised by the Late Middle Ages in Europe (1000-1400); Renaissance music (1400-1600); baroque music, which coincides with the development of baroque art (1600-1750); Classicism (1750-1800), which in the History of Music and Musicology is sometimes called "classical music"; Romanticism (1800-1910); and contemporary music, which includes the different currents of classical music of the 20th  century, which adopts the atonal and dissonant composition and other tendencies opposed to previous currents.

Due to both its technical characteristics, the growing professionalization of the profession of musician and composer, and the socio-cultural context in which it develops (under the patronage of the aristocracy, church and bourgeoisie), classical music is usually defined as the cultured tradition music .

Academic Music or Classical Music in general is mainly characterized by the type of language used, which is based on the broad and varied development of musical ideas from themes, motifs, subjects, countersubjects, phrases, contrapuntal structures, modulating passages, re-exhibition sections, thematic variations, etc. which are organized with the aim of creating a particular sound "narrative". With this, the composer creates a descriptive environment of abstract or concrete ideas converted into melody, harmony and rhythm, aimed at shaping a sound structure with some specific meaning.

In this sense, classical music is distinguished from "popular" music and other non-European musical forms by its characteristic symbolic musical notation, in use since about the 16th  century . Such notation allows composers to prescribe the tempo in detail. , the meter, the rhythm, the height and the precise execution of each piece of music. This limits the space for ad libitum improvisation or ornamentation, which is prevalent in non-European art music and popular music .Another characteristic is that while most "popular" styles tend to develop around the genre of songs, classical music has been characterized by the development of highly sophisticated and elaborate musical forms and genres, based on complex developments and the use of a very varied and perfected instrumentation. For this reason, Classical Music usually requires, both from the musicians and from the composers, a high degree of professionalization and specialization.

The term classical music first appears in the early 19th  century , in an attempt to highlight the period as a golden age of music .Currently this term is associated with the tradition of Cultured Music or Academic Music described above, and is sometimes substituted precisely by the terms Cultured Music or Academic Music to highlight its importance and character compared to popular music that has acquired status. "Classic" as exaltation of a particular value (Classic Jazz, Classic Rock, Classic Salsa, Classic Bolero, Classic Tango, etc.). In this sense, the term "Contemporary Music" has been reserved for Classical or Academic Music of the 20th century. However, popularly, the term classical music is usually reserved almost exclusively to refer to the content of this article.

Formalization and content

Classical music is made exclusively to be listened to, unlike other music attached to other forms of entertainment (film music is sometimes performed in concert halls). Classical music concerts usually have a solemn atmosphere, the audience is expected to be quiet to avoid distracting the musician and the listeners. Performers ordinarily dress formally, a practice seen as a gesture of respect for the music and the audience; and they also do not directly interact or joke with the public.

As in the fine arts, classical music aspires to communicate a transcendental quality of emotion, expressing something universal about the human condition. Although emotional expression is not an exclusive property of classical music, this depth of exploration into emotion allows the best classical music to reach what has been called the "sublime" in art. Many examples can be cited to demonstrate this. For example, the musicalization of Friedrich Schiller's poem "Ode to Joy" in the Ninth Symphonyby Beethoven, which is often performed at acts of national independence or celebration, such as that famous occasion when Leonard Bernstein conducted it to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the Japanese tradition of playing it to celebrate the New Year. However, other composers, such as Iannis Xenakis, argue that the emotional effect of music on listeners is arbitrary, and therefore the factual complexity or information content of the piece is paramount.

Throughout history, parents made sure that their children were educated in art music from an early age. An early musical experience provided the basis for later serious study. For those who wish to be performers, any instrument is virtually impossible to learn on a professional level if they, or at least one similar instrument, were not learned from childhood. Some parents sought music instruction for social reasons or in an effort to impart a useful sense of self-discipline; the lessons also seem to show an increase in academic performance. It is also considered that knowledge of classical music works is part of a good general culture.

Interpretation

Classical composers aspire to their music from a very deep relationship between its affective (emotional) content, and the means with which it achieves it. Many of the most praised classical works make use of musical development, the process by which a musical germ, idea, or motif is repeated in different contexts, or altered in such a way that the listener's mind, consciously or not, compares the different versions. . The classical genres of sonata form and fugue rigorously employ forms of musical development. Generally, works of classical music show great musical complexity thanks to the composer's use of development, modulation (changes in key), variation rather than exact repetition, musical phrases that are not always the same length, counterpoint, polyphony, and a sophisticated harmony. What's more, many fairly long classical works (30 minutes to 3 hours) are built from hierarchies of smaller units: phrases, periods, sections, and movements. Schenkerian analysis is a branch of music that tries to distinguish these structural levels.

Its written transmission, together with the veneration given to certain classical works, has led to the expectation that the performer will play the work in such a way as to carry out in detail the composer's original intentions. Therefore, deviations from the composer's instructions are sometimes condemned as complete ethical failures. During the 19th  century, the details that the composers placed in their scores were increasing. Thus we see an opposite rejection-admiration for performers who offer new "interpretations" of a composer's work, and it is not unheard of for a composer to ask the performer for a better realization of his original intentions than he himself was able to achieve. Thus, classical music performers often achieve very high reputations for their musicianship, even though they do not compose themselves. Another consequence of the primacy of the composer's written score is that improvisation plays a lesser presence, in stark contrast to other traditions such as jazz , where improvisation is basic. Improvisation in classical music was much more frequent in the Baroque than in the centuriesxix and xx , and recently the interpretation of that music by modern classical musicians has been enriched by the revival of ancient improvisational practices. During the classical period, Mozart and Beethoven sometimes improvised cadenzas for their piano concertos (and encouraged others to do the same), but they also tended to give written cadenzas for other soloists to use.

Popular music influences

Academic music has always been influenced by, or has taken material from, popular music. Examples include occasional music, such as Brahms's use of student drinking songs in his Overture to an Academic Festival , genres exemplified by Kurt Weill's Threepenny Opera, and the influence of jazz on the music of early and late composers. mid-20th  century , like Maurice Ravel. Certain postmodern and postminimalist classical composers acknowledge their debt to popular music. There are also many examples of influence in the other direction, including popular songs based on classical music, the use made of Pachelbel's Canon since the 1970s, the phenomenon ofmusical crossover , in which classical musicians achieve great success in the field of popular music (a notable example is the series of recordings Hooked on Classicsmade by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the early 1980s). In fact, it can be argued that the entire genre of film music can be considered part of this influence, since it brings orchestral music to mere vast film audiences who would not otherwise listen to such music (however, most listen to it). unconsciously). Classical music composers have made use of folk music (music created by self-taught musicians, mostly from a pure oral tradition). Some have done so with an explicit nationalist ideology, others have simply exploited it as part of their thematic material. Some pieces of classical music are often used commercially (ie, in advertising or as part of entertainment movie soundtracks). In television advertising,Cármina Burana by Carl Orff for the strong presence of the percussion and the choir providing an epic passage. Mention may also be made of Mozart's Requiem "Dies Irae" and Aaron Copland's Rodeo selections . Similarly, clichéd passages from classical music are often used in films to represent refinement or opulence: probably the most listened to work in this category is Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik .

Music notation

Since ancient Greece (as far as Western music is concerned) there are forms of musical notation. However, it is from the music of the Middle Ages (mainly Gregorian chant) that the musical notation system that would evolve to the current one began to be used. In the Renaissance it crystallized with the more or less definitive features with which we know it today, although - like all languages ​​- it has been changing according to the expressive needs of the users.

The system is based on two axes: one horizontal, which graphically represents the passing of time, and another vertical, which graphically represents the height of the sound. The pitches are read in relation to a staff (a set of five horizontal lines) that at the beginning has a «key» that has the function of attributing a certain musical note to one of the lines of the staff. In a staff headed by the treble clef on the second line we will read the sound written on the second line (counting from the bottom) as G, as the sound written in the space between the second and third lines, as if the sound on the third line, etc. Additional lines are written for sounds that fall outside the key. The most used keys are those of Do in the third line (key that takes as reference the Do of 261,

Musical discourse is divided into equal units of time called bars: each vertical line across the staff marks the end of one bar and the beginning of the next. At the beginning of the staff there will be a fraction with two numbers; the top number indicates the number of beats each bar has; the bottom number tells us what the unit of time will be.

To write the durations, a system of musical figures is used: the round one (represented as a white circle), the white one (a white circle with a vertical stick called a stem), the black one (same as the white one but with a black circle), the eighth note (same as the quarter note but with a horizontal stick starting at the stem tip), the sixteenth note (same as the eighth note but with two horizontal sticks), etc. Each one is worth half of its predecessor: the white one is worth half as much as a round one and twice as much as a black one, etc.

Figures are relative durations; to know which figure is the unit of time in a certain score, we must look at the lower number of the compass indication: if it is 1, each round will correspond to a beat; if it is 2, each white will correspond to a beat; if it is 4, each beat will be represented by a quarter note, etc. Thus, a score headed by a 3/4 will be divided into bars in which three quarter notes enter (or six eighth notes, or one quarter note and four eighth notes, etc.); a measure of 4/8 will have four beats, each represented by an eighth note, etc.

To represent the rests, the system has other signs that represent a round rest, a white rest, etc.

As can be seen, the durations are established according to a binary relationship (double or half), which does not provide for subdivision by three, which will be indicated with "triplets". When you want a note or rest to have half its duration added, you put a dot to the right of it (dot). When you want the note to last, in addition to its value, another certain value, two notes are written and joined by means of an arched line called a ligature of prolongation.

In general, the incapacities of the system are remedied by resorting to more or less conventional written words, generally in Italian. Thus, for example, intensities are indicated by using an f ( forte , strong) or a p ( piano , soft), or several fs and ps together. The speed of the beats or tempo is indicated by words at the beginning of the score which are, in order of speed: Largo , Lento , Adagio , Moderato , Andante , Allegro , Presto .

Instrumentation

Classical music is also distinguished by the instruments they use. The instruments used in the common practice of classical music were invented before the middle of the 19th  century (most much earlier), and codified in the  18th and 19th  centuries . They consist of the instruments found in the symphony orchestra, along with a few other solo instruments (such as the piano, harpsichord, and organ). Electronic instruments, such as the electric guitar and electric violin, play a predominant role in popular music, but in fact they have none in classical music before the 20th  century , and they only appear occasionally in 20th and 21st century classical music  .. Both popular and classical musicians have experimented in recent decades with electric instruments, such as the synthesizer, with electronic and digital techniques, such as the use of sampled or computer-generated sounds, and the sound of instruments from other cultures, such as the gamelan. It is important to note that all bass instruments did not exist before the Renaissance. In medieval music, instruments were divided into two categories: loud instruments for use outdoors or in church, and softer instruments for use indoors. Many of the instruments that are associated with popular music today played an important role in early classical music, such as the bagpipe, vihuela, hurdy-gurdy, and other wind instruments. On the other hand, the acoustic guitar, associated with popular music, xix and xx . The human voice is also a privileged musical instrument in classical music, although it is also used in popular music. Various genres use voices, alone or with instrumental accompaniment: opera, choral music and lied.

While equal temperament was gradually accepted as the tuning system in the 18th  century , other temperament types, of historical origin, are often employed in music from periods before the late Baroque; The well-tempered harpsichord of Johann Sebastian Bach is used as a time reference to indicate the beginning of this change in temperament. For example, English Renaissance music is customarily performed in the middle temperament.

History of classical music

Origins

The 17th and 18th centuries were the formative period for classical music and saw the birth of opera and oratorio, sonata, concerto and symphony. The Italians were the first to develop these genres, but the Germans, Austrians and English soon followed. Classical music emerged by taking elements from other Western musical traditions, both liturgical and secular, for example the music of Ancient Greece or the Music of Ancient Rome (mainly for their theoretical contributions), or the music of the Catholic Church (mainly Gregorian chant).

The milestones that defined its course were the discovery and subsequent development of polyphonics, as well as the subsequent development of harmony, the musical revolution known as the Ars nova and the evolution of musical notation, in addition to the study of musical aesthetics. With the age of discoveries that began in the fifteenth  century and subsequent colonialism, classical music reached other continents and underwent a synthesis with the musical traditions of the new territories. We find expressions of classical music in Brazil (for example, Heitor Villa-Lobos), the United States (for example, Charles Ives), Latin American (for example, Alberto Ginastera, José Ángel Montero), Asia (for example, Takemitsu, Tan Dun ), Africa and Oceania, but which are connected to classical music of European tradition.

Periods of years ago

There is a widely accepted system of dividing the history of classical music composition into different periods. The dates are generalizations, since the periods overlap each other. Some authorized voices subdivide the periods, the date or the genre. However, it should be noted that these categories are arbitrary; for example, the use of counterpoint and fugue, which is considered a characteristic of the Baroque, was continued by Mozart, who is considered a classical composer, and by Beethoven, who is usually described as being between the classical and romantic period. ; and also by Brahms, who is classified as a romantic. According to this system, the main divisions are:

• Renaissance music : The concept of Renaissance was used by the painter Vasari in the year 1500 and is usually used to refer to the art of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in Italy. This term signifies a rebirth of man from a deliberate encounter with Antiquity. The new image of man also leads to a new type of artist (with precursors in the sixteenth  century ): the genius, who feels a creative force in a divine order. Likewise, the new self-awareness of man is reflected in the ecclesiastical disturbances and in the religious wars, in the numerous councils held in the fifteenth  century, in the reforming work especially of Martin Luther and in the Counter-Reformation with the Council of Trent. The stylistic characteristics that define Renaissance music are its polyphonic texture, which follows the laws of counterpoint, and is governed by the modal system inherited from Gregorian chant. Among its most widespread musical forms are the mass and the motet in the religious genre, the madrigal, the carol and the chanson in the secular genre, and the dances, the ricercare and the canzona in instrumental music. Among the most outstanding composers of this period are Josquin Desprez, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Orlando di Lasso and Tomás Luis de Victoria.
• Baroque music : Between 1600 and 1750. The use of more complex tonalities arises, instead of modality and counterpoint. Keyboard instruments (harpsichord and organ) become popular. The most outstanding composers of the Baroque period are Georg Friedrich Händel and Johann Sebastian Bach.
• Classical music : Between 1730 and 1820, it was an important era that established several of the norms of composition and structure. The classical period is also marked by the disappearance of the harpsichord and harpsichord in favor of the new piano, which from then on became the predominant instrument for keyboard performance and composition.
• Romantic music : Between 1815 and 1910. Period in which the practice was codified, the role of music in cultural life was extended and institutions were created for the teaching, execution and conservation of musical works.
• Modern music : Between 1905 and 1985. It represented a crisis in the values ​​of classical music and its role in intellectual life, and the extension of theory and technique. Some theorists, such as Arnold Schoenberg in his essay Brahms, the Progressive , insist that Modernism represents a logical progression of trends in nineteenth-  century composition . Others hold an opposite point of view, indicating that modernism represents the rejection or negation of the classical method of composition.
• 20th-Century Music : Typically used to describe the wide variety of post-Romantic subgenres in use up to the year 2000, including post-Romantic, modern, and postmodern
• Contemporary classical music : The term is sometimes used to describe music composed in the last years of the 20th  century to the present.
• The prefix neo is often used to describe a 20th-  century or contemporary composition written in a genre from an earlier period, such as classical, romantic, or modern, but in modern language. For example, Prokofiev 's Classical Symphony ―which follows the models of Haydn's symphony of classicism― is considered a neoclassical composition .

The following chart shows a summary selection of the most famous classical music composers: